


Mistakes Were Made: 41 A.D.

by eag



Series: Mistakes Were Made [3]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 6000 Years of Pining (Good Omens), 6000 Years of Slow Burn (Good Omens), Ancient History, Ancient Rome, Aziraphale and Crowley in the Roman Empire but they still prefer Ancient Greek things, Be Gay and Do Crimes, Caligula - Freeform, Crowley crashes a banquet, Falling In Love, Feels, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Genderfluid Character, Implied Suicide Attempt, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Latin, Loss, Love, Memory Loss, Nonbinary Character, Other, Roman Empire, Sexual Harassment, Slow Burn, The slowest burn in history, Unrequited Love, atmospheric date night, but Caligula probably doesn't appreciate it, graphic heterodoxy and heresy, it's not smart to sexually harass a demon, long walks through the streets of Rome, those last two are definitely not graphic at all, well they're not crimes if you're a demon, why that isn't a tag already is beyond me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-06
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-08-10 20:44:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20141722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eag/pseuds/eag
Summary: ...or the Life of That One Caesar That Crowley Finds Absolutely Appalling.  Following Suetonius'The Lives of the Twelve Caesars.Sent to tempt Caligula, Crowley finds a terrible day is vastly improved by a chance meeting with Aziraphale.  Unfortunately Aziraphale has just recently returned from a long stint of Heavenly indoctrination and remembers little of their relationship before his recall to Heaven eight years ago.Of course, mistakes were made...





	1. Rome, 41 A.D.

**Rome, 41 A.D.**

“Otium before Negotium!” A man shouted and tried to grab her wrist. Failing, he got up to catch her about the waist, but Crowley glared him down, slapping off another inquisitive hand as she made it around an elegant supper couch that was appallingly stained with wine and other fluids that she did not feel like speculating on.

To say it was an orgy, was to say that Rome was a minor city-state on a little peninsula off of another larger peninsula stuck in the west of Asia. This was an orgy of orgies, and Crowley scowled as she made her way through the crowded room, knowing that she could not do as she pleased for there were too many watchful eyes, but wishing she could turn into a serpent right here and now and see just how that went down among the humans. 

“Beautiful stranger from a strange land, have you time for me?” A man caught her ankle as she passed, and Crowley kicked him off viciously.

“No, I'm not free,” she hissed.

Dodging grabbing hands, Crowley stumbled out into a hallway and then into a courtyard, planted with all manner of fruiting trees though their leaves had long since dropped for the winter. Stepping out from a richly decorated mosaic floor, Crowley took a minute to breathe, wondering how she was going to find the right person in all this mess. 

It was icy cold out here, unusual for Rome this time of year, but this was a vast improvement over the heat of the banquet hall which was not so much inviting as nauseating. Crowley drew her clothes around her tighter, glad for the black chlamys shot through with red that kept her warm. It was so cold she could see her own breaths, and she wondered what she should do next.

And then she heard weeping.

Crowley stepped forward, curious. A young woman with black hair stood in a grove of skeletal trees almost hidden in the deep shade of the courtyard, a slim shadow among shadows, and Crowley saw a flash of something that shone silver in the weak winter sunlight; a knife.

“Wait. What are you doing?” Moving fast, Crowley caught the knife before it could come down onto the tender inner flesh of a thin wrist. “That's not how you cut your wrist. It's more like this if you want to do more than give yourself a bad scratch,” Crowley pantomimed the motion with the knife, feeling it tremble under a white-knuckled hand.

The knife fell, clattering to the ground and Crowley gave it a nudge with her sandaled toe, so that it slipped into a bush, disappearing from existence.

She let go of the woman, whose choked sobs filled the air with a pitiful, muffled sound.

“What's wrong?” Crowley sighed; she didn't have time for this but there didn't seem to be much of a choice. When the young woman stooped to fumble for the knife again, Crowley pulled her up, struggling with her briefly.

Tugging off dark glasses, she met the young woman's eyes with a serpent's gaze.

“Look into my eyes and tell me what I want to know. Tell me everything,” Crowley hissed.

The woman seemed to go very limp, though she remained standing, her eyes fixed on Crowley.

“I will not be dishonored. To protect my wifely chastity from foul adultery...I must go the way of Lucretia and Verginia. But I am afraid, deathly afraid. I don't want to die.” Entranced, her eyes still glimmered with brimming tears, and Crowley gently brushed them away. 

“Well, you should be afraid of death. It's no good what comes after. Why are you doing this again?”

“Because Gaius Caesar chose me at the banquet, and I cannot refuse him. He wants me in his chambers to despoil as he pleases. If I don't do this, he would have my husband tortured and killed, and all that we possess taken, and then what would become of me and my children? Sold into slavery, most likely, or executed. It's better to do this than be destroyed and dispossessed...” 

“Really? Gaius Caesar? Ah yes. Caligula.” Crowley stalked away, throwing her hands up in a gesture of outrage, snarling with indignation. “Then what's the blasted point of sending me to tempt him? This is already well beyond what I was sent to do! Absolutely appalling! Fine. If it’s going to be like this... All right.” 

Crowley heaved a sigh and walked back to the woman, staring deep into her eyes. “You're going to go home now, and you will tell your husband will take you and the kids out of Rome. For say, about a month or three. No, make it four. Call it vacation, go to Alexandria, rent out a seaside villa. It's quite nice this time of year. I know it would take a demonic intervention for him to listen to a woman, but I think you'll find him very understanding and agreeable in this regard. In fact, in any regard, from now on. You won't remember any of this when you wake. You especially won’t remember me. You'll just want to get away from here, as fast as possible.” 

“Yes...” the woman's voice was no more than a sigh, and she swayed a little at the sound of Crowley's voice, her gaze fixed on brilliant serpent's eyes.

“But before you go, tell me where I can find Gaius Caesar?” And the woman told Crowley everything she needed to know. 

Crowley snapped her fingers, and the woman stared at Crowley in confusion, not recognizing the demon, before hiking up the heavy skirts of her stola and running away.


	2. You're Lucky I'm Not a Demon of Higher Rank

“Gaius Caesar, Gaius Caesar. Where are you?” Crowley kicked open another door in the Emperor's suite just for the pleasure of breaking something. No guards, he thought, and to him that seemed rather odd, unless the guards were so used to unsavory dealings that they didn't bother checking up on strange sounds. Nothing like Alexander, Crowley thought, now that was a human king worth knowing. 

“Speaking of Alexander, what exactly are you wearing?” Crowley's jaw dropped. A tall man stepped out into the hallway, taller even than Crowley, a dissipated and dissolute man whose dissipations made him look easily at least a decade older than he was. A false beard made of gold was strapped to his face, making his balding head look even more ridiculous. Besides the gleaming laurel crown on his head, he wore everything heartily and overwhelmingly dipped in Tyrian purple and currently had the breastplate of Alexander strapped to his torso over his clothes. The breastplate seemed comically small, the armour of a fighting man strapped to a man who one could hardly call a man; rather, a lumpen boy grown overlarge.

“Albina, my darling! Finally you have arrived. You make me yearn like Apollo for his nymph! Nymphs.” Caligula's eyes were cold and cruel, betraying no emotion but raw hunger.

“Albina? Really.” Crowley couldn't help but smirk. 

“And why are you hiding your beautiful eyes behind that strange contraption? Are they not the color of the dazzling sea?”

“They are not. Never have been. Maybe more like the dazzling sun, if you were stupid enough to stare,” Crowley hissed.

“And your lips, your delicious lips, just like cherries in Maius...”

“Or like blood,” Crowley suggested.

“And so tall and slim like Venus herself!”

“I think you mean Diana,” Crowley said. “You know, with the wild beasts and the tearing apart. I'm rather fond of the wild beasts and the tearing apart.”

“But why is it that you have changed into clothes of such somber colors? Are you in mourning? You must be in mourning, for you yearn to be ravaged by my formidable-” 

“Okay, you can stop right there.” Disgusted, Crowley made a face. 

“You're so beautiful, my Albina. You're so lovely that I could just kill you. Should I? I could. No one could stop me. No one would stop me. So beautiful a throat must be cut whenever I please. Or throttled. Not sure if today I feel like today is a cutting or a throttling kind of day. Come here and let me get a better look so I can decide...the kind of look that a husband gives a wife, all the way under, underneath her stola and tunica. Though...didn't you have black hair? Wasn’t it longer?”

“Obviously you remembered wrong. Perhaps you drink too much,” Crowley said finding himself backing up, watching Caligula warily as the human approached, with firm and sure footsteps that belied his dissipated look. “You should really reconsider what you’re about to do. In fact, you should really reconsider a lot of what you do. Everything that you do.”

“There is nothing in my nature that I commend or approve so much, as my inflexible rigor. And my inflexible-”

“Oh no.” Crowley felt his back pressed to the wall and turned to glance at it. Of course it was an erotic fresco. A very large and explicit one. “That’s quite enough from you. I’m sure I know what you mean. I don’t need to hear any more-” 

“Albina! Come here so we can play Carthage and Rome. I'll be conquering Rome, so I'm going to raze you to the ground and salt your earth.” Before Crowley could react, Caligula grabbed him. 

There was a brief, fierce struggle as the emperor dragged Crowley into a room toward a tumbled and stained bed. Caligula pulled at Crowley’s clothes, tearing the fine fabric of his deep gray woolen stola, ripping off his crimson-streaked chlamys.

“Remember that I have the right to do anything to anybody,” Caligula huffed, trying to get a better grip on Crowley.

“So do I.” With a snap of Crowley’s fingers, Caligula froze.

“This would have been pretty useful back in the wilderness outside Uruk. Could have saved me a few days of trouble,” Crowley muttered, wriggling out of Caligula's grip, stepping back to catch his breath. Absently he straightened his clothes as he stalked about the place, repinning his stola with shaking hands, looking at the carnage of the room. Torn and stained bedding, pillows, drapery, overturned furniture...the ruins of lavish decorations all spoke to the atrocities that had been already committed in this room.

“Could purify it with fire, but doubt my lot would be pleased,” Crowley scowled, considering the problem. “Could just leave him like this but that'd be a problem too, once someone found him. After all, he's still emperor of Rome. For now.” Crowley draped the torn length of his stola over his right arm. Pacing the room, Crowley tried to think of a solution, occasionally giving furniture a kick or a rattle to keep the guards thinking that there was something else going on in the Emperor's rooms.

Eventually, he came back to the Emperor. Crowley let his dark glasses slip down his nose and peered over the lenses into Caligula's eyes as he eased some of the time back to normal so that the human's perception went smoothly from frozen time to complete enthrallment.

“Wakey wakey,” Crowley said to the entranced Emperor. “You're lucky I'm not a demon of higher rank; if it were anyone else you'd be left a greasy stain on the floor.”

“Mmm...greasy stain...”

“Imagine trying to pull this on a Prince of Hell; Beelzebub would have had you garroted with your own entrails, and that's just to start. If you were lucky.”

“Mmm...entrails...”

Crowley felt a bad taste in his mouth. “Look, here is the temptation I'm leaving you with. You're going to be tempted to trust everyone, especially your centurions and praetorian tribunes. They just _adore_ you and want nothing but the best for you. And if by some demonic miracle in the next couple weeks or so someone or many someones stabs you multiple times, especially in the groin, you'll do all you can to not survive it, you hear?”

“Right...in the groin.”

“Good. Now you're going to have a stupid dream that you molested that Albina girl but you won't remember her name, her family name, her husband, or why you even wanted to molest her in the first place. Wait, that’s no good, that’s not enough. All right, when you’re done with that, have a terrible dream about whatever you fear the most. And then clean your room, young man, this place is an appalling mess. You’re an appalling mess. Wake up in about an hour, I have other business to attend to.”

Crowley plucked the laurel crown off the Emperor's head, and in his hands it dared not to be anything but clean and untouched, shining and new. It also stopped being gold. “Oh nice, that's electrum. Think I'll be keeping this. This is what, a twentieth of a talent? Not bad,” Crowley said as he set the crown upon his head where it settled among dark curls in striking contrast.

He picked up his black and crimson chlamys, shaking it out. Not bothering to try to drape it, he folded it to hide the torn edges of the cloth and set it around his shoulders. 

When he stepped outside again, the air was freezing, even colder than it had been before, and it smelled like snow. 

And then Crowley heaved a sigh, realizing he had to cut back through the banquet hall to get out.


	3. Little Round Oysters From Brittania

The beer tasted terrible and was nearly thick enough to warrant the use of a straw. Crowley had another sip before putting it back down, wondering why in Rome would a tavern serve him beer, other than he had obviously walked into the wrong tavern.

And yet, it wasn’t exactly the wrong one either. He glanced back again at Aziraphale, and felt the hint of a smile sneaking onto his lips. 

“Yes, it's my job to do the tempting. But I'm willing to let you pick up a shift or two if that's what you'd like.” 

“Crowley, oh, really. Must you always be so...” Aziraphale paused, losing his train of thought as his gaze passed over the demon. “What’s happened to you?”

“Hmm? What?” 

“Who tore your stola?”

Crowley froze, wondering how the angel knew and then he realized he still had the torn length of the stola folded and draped across his right forearm.

Aziraphale pointed down toward Crowley’s legs. “I can see your tunica. And you're all disheveled. Well, not completely, it's hard to tell with all the black but your clothes are draped all wrong and-”

“Hazards of the trade,” Crowley said lightly. “Don't worry about it. It's not like a human could actually seriously harm me.” Crowley fingered the torn stola, letting it fall. 

“And you're just going to leave it like that?” Aziraphale fussed.

“Why not? Hazards of the trade, right? Besides, it's no big deal. Stolas come and go. I'll live.”

“But it's letting in a draft and...and look, you're shivering already. Here, let me miracle it away.” Aziraphale met his eyes. “If that's all right?”

“If it means so much to you,” Crowley said, in anticipation, feeling his pulse quicken. 

“There, all better.” 

Crowley sighed, catching a faint whiff of Egyptian lavender as his clothes straightened up and mended themselves around him. The jagged lines of crimson in his chlamys settled down out into a neat red double border, and the cloth settled over his shoulders in the form of a lovingly draped palla, and he felt something tight inside loosen as he drew the black fabric close, hugging himself.

“You know, that laurel crown looks awfully familiar,” Aziraphale said, opening the door to Petronius' restaurant for Crowley. “I'm pretty sure I've seen it before but I can't think of where.” 

“What, this? Nah. It's new though.” A servant showed them to a table that had just opened up near the blazing hearth and as Crowley sat down, something about the warmth of the fire and the lengthening shadows as the cool winter sun set made something inside of him unclench and relax.

“Are you celebrating something? Did you perhaps receive a commendation while I was gone? ‘Victorious over the powers of Good?’”

“Nah. It just caught my eye. Do you like it?” Crowley smiled, touching the crown.

“Electrum suits you,” Aziraphale said, leaning forward to examine the details of the leaves. “Especially when it's more silver than gold. It looks striking against all that black and crimson. Very handsome.”

Crowley felt his mouth try to move in four or five different directions at once. A few seconds later he realized that Aziraphale was still talking and he had not been listening.

“...a few fresh leaves for modesty's sake.”

“Huh? What?”

“You know, so as not to vie for the honors of the gods themselves. God,” Aziraphale said, correcting himself. “Here, let me.” And the angel reached over to the demon, gently touching the wreath of electrum, and fresh bay leaves sprang up, artfully arranged between the electrum and Crowley's dark hair.

Reaching up to touch an aromatic leaf, Crowley felt a flower instead. He drew it out of his hair and was surprised to find a dark blue Egyptian lotus, which he carefully put back in place. Taking a moment to catch his breath, Crowley managed something that looked like a smile. “Erm. So. Uh. Been back long?”

“Just arrived in Rome last month from Heaven,” Aziraphale smiled gently. “Eight years in training, can you believe it?”

It took Crowley a long moment before he could regain his composure and properly reply. “Sure. Your head office seems to assign a lot of training.” 

“They do indeed. Have you ever been recalled for training?”

“Nope. They don't bother with me. Most I do is report back in every now and again for meeting or a presentation. Rest of the time it's just memos.” Crowley sat back to watch the angel order food, watching that extraordinarily polite manner with which Aziraphale dealt with humans. 

“Falernian? No, not that. I find it doesn’t suit my taste,” Aziraphale said to the server. “Do you have something Greek? Yes, a wine from Crete is fine.” 

Of course, the angel paid in gold as he always did. 

An amphora of wine, a jug of water, a ladle, and an empty vessel for mixing was brought over. Waving off the server Aziraphale mixed in the water himself in that charming and old-fashioned Attic way instead of the modern Roman style, before pouring them each a generous cup.

“Not fond of Falernian?” Crowley asked, curious.

“It’s rather too strong and sweet for my taste. And for some reason it makes me melancholy. Don’t know why, really. After all, it’s just wine, and I know I like wine. It shouldn’t make me feel so sad.” Aziraphale sighed. “I wish they had the right drinking vessels here. These deep cups are so strange to drink from. So immoderate.”

“You don’t say. Funny thing, I feel the same way about Falernian-”

“But look at you!” Aziraphale beamed, shaking off whatever strange mood had overcome him. “I like what you've done with your hair, Crowley. I've never seen it so short.”

Crowley suddenly forgot what he meant to say. “Ah, uh. Well...”

“May I ask why you cut it?”

“At first...at first it was for mourning. Then I remembered that it made it easier to move through the world, looking mostly like a man. These days especially. The Pax Romana only stops the wars; it doesn't stop anyone from trying to carry off a woman or someone they think is a woman...”

“Mourning?”

Crowley hesitated, not sure of how much he wanted to tell Aziraphale when Crowley himself was not certain how much the angel knew or remembered. “I. I lost an old friend. Thought they were gone for good.” The cup of wine went down faster than he expected it, and he let Aziraphale pour him another.

“I'm sorry to hear that,” Aziraphale said gently. “Is it someone I know?” 

“It's a long story,” Crowley said, waving it off. “I don't think you'd find it very interesting. Fortunately, it seems that my friend wasn't gone forever; they must have had some unexpected business in a foreign land and have come back unexpectedly. Things have changed between us; that can’t be helped. But at least I’m not in mourning anymore. Though I may just keep the hair like this.”

“It's nice. But it was beautiful when it was long too. I always thought it was very... Well, I'll get used to this new look, I'm sure- Oh good! Fish soup, hold the garum.” Aziraphale beamed. “Shall I serve you a portion?”

“Please,” Crowley said, pleased that Aziraphale had remembered that he did not have a taste for garum. When had they talked about that? Lifetimes ago, he thought, if he had been human, but he was not and had never been.

The soup was hot and briny with tender morsels of fresh fish, lentils, and greens, as well as something else.

“What is this?” Crowley asked, scooping something out of the soup with a piece of bread.

“Oysters, my dear. Little round oysters from Brittania swimming in a bubbling sea...” Aziraphale smiled sweetly.

Many courses of all sorts of different preparations of oysters later, Crowley was half-asleep in his chair, drowsy and comfortable, watching Aziraphale savoring the last bites of a honey cake.

“So what did you think of the oysters, Crowley?”

“I still like fish better, raw fish, I might add, but oysters are fine,” Crowley said. “Could I eat them raw, do you think?”

“Certainly. They’re excellent raw but they would have to be fresh, directly from the sea. If you want to eat them that way in Rome, they’re quite dear.”

“Maybe next time,” Crowley said, leaning back in a comfortable slump, pleasantly full. 

Aziraphale's eyebrows went up. “I'm sorry, I don't think there could be a next time.”

“Why not?” 

“You're a demon and I'm an angel! We've been enemies since the first war!” 

“Yes, I know.” Crowley sighed in resignation as they tread the same familiar paths; it was obvious the angel did or could not remember that they had spoken about all of this before in exacting detail. “Certainly can't forget that. But have you considered that despite it all, we're not enemies directly? I mean, it's not as if we personally fought hand to hand during the first war, the way angels like Gabriel and Beelzebub did. Or Asmodeus and Michael.”

“I suppose you have a point there.”

Crowley changed the subject. “Listen, on the off-chance that there is a next time, whatever that means...what would you want to do?”

“Are you asking me? What I want?” Shocked, Aziraphale fell silent.

“Yes, you. Who else would I be asking? I want to know.”

“Well. I...that is- You. You really want to know what I want?”

“Of course.”

Crowley waited patiently as Aziraphale thought about it, staring at the angel intently through dark lenses. 

“Attend a banquet at the Imperial Court? I hear they have the best chefs in the world.” 

“No, you don't want to do that. Trust me, you really do not want to do that.” Crowley said. “In fact, promise me you won't do that. It wouldn't be safe for you, you’re too appealing. Try again.”

“A-all right. I won't go. Not unless I'm ordered to. Promise.” Then Aziraphale straightened up primly, brightening up. “How about...Brittania!”

“Brittania? I've been there a few times. Seemed fine. Green and damp.”

“I'd like to go back sometime. Haven't been since Julius Caesar's day. It would be so nice to have oysters fresh right there, instead of the imported stuff. It's just not the same once they've had a swim through the Mediterranean at the bottom of a boat or have been packed in a barrel of brine. They're better fresh, right from the cold waters...”

“Really? Makes that big of a difference?”

“Oh yes. What about you, Crowley? Is there something you'd like to do? If...there could be a next time.”

Crowley opened his mouth, but nothing came out, nothing clear. Nothing that could say that he wanted next time to be like this time. It was enough to be here like this by the warm fire, a cup of wine in his hands, Aziraphale by his side and time slipping by as slowly as it ever did but all too fast at once.

“Pella. Almost four hundred years ago. When Alexander was this big, just a boy.” 

“Oh heavens, I haven't thought of that in years...was that one of ours or one of yours?”

“I don't remember,” Crowley lied.

“I don’t either.”

“But there is something...” Aziraphale’s eyes narrowed as if he were trying to remember something important. Crowley leaned forward, curious fingers touching the point of his own chin thoughtfully and then the angel pointed to the gleaming laurel crown on Crowley’s head. “Wait a minute. Speaking of Alexander...I know where I've seen that crown before. Isn't that the Emperor's?!”

Crowley fell back laughing and it felt like it had been ages upon ages since he had laughed so heartily and so sincerely.


	4. But Remember Whom You Leave Shackled by Love

The unusual cold meant that the winter streets were almost completely empty of people, and what few people that were still out were miraculously avoided. In the early darkness that blanketed the city, warm and wavering lamplight began to light up some of the homes and taverns. But the waxing moon was bright and the pale stone-paved streets looked all the whiter in the cold moonlight as they walked through the strangely silent streets of Rome. 

They crossed the Tiber at the Pons Aemilius, where the blocks of creamy travertine looked as white as snow, reminding Crowley of something else. He pressed a hand to his side, feeling the smooth outline of the ancient stone knife that he kept strapped to his body beneath his clothing. For a moment as he walked he closed his eyes, remembering how he found it in the deep shade of a sycamore tree buried in soft earth beneath a loose brick, wrapped in a large square of raw undyed silk in a sealed wooden box.

When he thought about it, it was as if he could still smell the damp soil on his fingers, wet from a soft pouring rain falling warm like tears.

“Say, Aziraphale. Whatever happened to that stone knife you used to carry? The one with the white blade and the white handle?” Crowley asked, as casually as possible.

“The stone knife?” Aziraphale paused. “Oh! I...I must have misplaced it.” 

“Gave it away, did you?”

“I must have. I don't remember,” Aziraphale said. “I think that was a very long time ago.”

“Maybe, but it was important to you. You carried it for well over two thousand years and owned it for more than twice as long as that.” Crowley sighed. “I've noticed. Noticed that after you've been to Head Office for training...you lose things,” Crowley said the last few words very, very softly.

“Hmm?”

“Never mind. It's nothing.” 

“No, I heard you. I just...I don't know how it happens... I suppose-” Aziraphale stopped, and straightened up, hands folded behind his back. “The training is intensive. I'm to smile more. Be more polite. Be of good service to God and humanity. Customer service, you know, have to be good and obedient to Heaven's will. Archangels dogging your every breath the whole time...asking questions over and over... There is a lot to learn, lots of new policies since the crucifixion and, and I'm not very good at everything they want me to do yet and really I do try my best but...” 

“You're fine, angel. Wonderful, just the way God made you. I just wish other angels wouldn't interfere with that,” Crowley sighed. 

“Hmm?”

“Nothing, it's nothing. You know, you don't have to walk me back to the insula, I can get there by myself.”

“I know, but.” Aziraphale stayed close by his right. “Safety in numbers and all.”

“Still worried about that torn stola?”

“Yes. I would hate for someone to try to carry you off. I might not have a flaming sword or even a knife anymore but I know things.”

Crowley looked away, concealing a smile. “Things?”

“I could protect you. From people who might want to carry off a fellow angel. That is, a fallen- Um. Well, you.”

“Aziraphale, you know I wouldn't want to make you do any of the dirty work. After all, you're the nice one.”

“Oh, that's very kind of you, but when one raises one's hand in righteous anger to defend the innocent-”

“Innocent? You think rather too highly of me, angel.” Crowley smiled indulgently at Aziraphale, who paused, embarrassed.

“Right. I suppose I rather do.” Aziraphale said, meeting Crowley’s eyes as if the smoked lenses meant nothing, his voice very serious.

It took Crowley a few moments to remember how legs and feet worked.

“N-now, I...I don't think you've noticed, but we've circled this neighborhood three times.” Crowley began, but then Aziraphale smiled up at him, not with the kind of ingratiating smile that he gave to the humans, when the angel thought he had to be at work, but a rare and true smile which for Aziraphale was an expression that came solely from the eyes, a gentle look that did not quite make it to his lips.

“Oh no, I've noticed. And I know where you're staying. You look at it every time we go round.”

They stopped, and a whisper of dead leaves blew past their feet. A brief flurry of snow scattered from the sky, a gentle touch of ice that barely breathed against the skin, no more than a few soft flakes that pressed delicate kisses of ice to their cheeks.

“Why don’t you come in and have a drink to warm up before you go? It’s getting quite chilly out here, and I have a nice jar of Greek wine upstairs. I’ll miracle us up some garlands of flowers, whatever you like. Remember those white lotuses you used to wear in Alexandria? I thought those were very becoming. We could play kottabos, make it a proper little party...” 

“You know I’m no good at kottabos.” 

“Then...another time.”

“There won’t be another time.” Aziraphale said politely. “Good night, Crowley.”

Disappointed, Crowley went in. He paused in the shadowed entry and took a breath. It would have to do for now, Crowley thought, because of course, there would always be another time. Aziraphale just did not know his own mind, at least not yet. The important thing was that the angel had returned.

The demon hiked up his skirts and trudged upstairs to his dark room on the second floor. Shutting and locking the door after himself, he went over to the window.

Aziraphale was where Crowley had left him, waiting to make certain that he was safely inside. Crowley waved, and the angel waved back. Crowley leaned out against the sill of the window, about to say something, but then paused, turning his head. 

Somewhere in the towering insula or perhaps in the one next door, came the sound of a soft sweet voice singing a familiar song in that old Aeolian dialect that they both remembered with deep fondness. It was strange to hear those words unaccompanied by a lyre or a kithara; it sounded almost hollow, empty, the voice of someone who thought themselves alone and unheard, a small and forgotten voice far from home, lost in the sprawling grandeur of Rome.

_ I have not had one word from her_  
_ Frankly I wish I were dead._  
_ When she left, she wept _

_ a great deal; she said to _  
_ me, “This parting must be _  
_ endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly.”_

_ I said, “Go, and be happy but remember _  
_ – you know well – _  
_ whom you leave shackled by love._

_ “If you forget me, think _  
_ of our gifts to Aphrodite_  
_ and all the loveliness that we shared_

_ “All the violet tiaras,_  
_ braided rosebuds, dill, and_  
_ crocus twined around your young neck_

_ “Myrrh poured on your head_  
_ and on soft mats girls with_  
_ all that they most wished for beside them._

_ “While no voices chanted_  
_ choruses without ours,_  
_ no woodlot bloomed in spring without song...”_

Snow began to fall in earnest, and as the last echoes of the song disappeared into muffled silence, the angel smiled brightly, looking up at Crowley, hands raised as if in an attitude of prayer to feel the gentle touch of snowflakes against his palms. Hand outstretched, Crowley felt the snow too, looking down at Aziraphale, the sting of ice melting cold on his palm and the sting of something else in his heart.

At least the angel had been sent back to Earth. And it was obvious that despite whatever Aziraphale didn’t or couldn’t remember, the angel’s heart was intact; Crowley was certain of it. It was all still there, what they had and would always have, and he had seen it clearly as if it were a tiny crown of gleaming gold half-buried in the sand, obscured by dark and muddy waters.

Time. All it would take was time. Patience, and time. And Crowley figured that he had time enough. After all, they had more than three thousand years before this last recall to Heaven; what would another three thousand be? It would be a challenge, certainly, but he was always up for challenges.

He smiled to himself, no more than a wistful motion of his lips. Crowley sat on the brick ledge of the window. The red-bordered palla was warm and soft on his shoulders, and he drew it close, burying his nose in the scent of Egyptian lavender, remembering the past. Remembering for them both.

When he looked again, Aziraphale was gone.


	5. Jerusalem, 33 A.D.

**Jerusalem, 33 A.D. **

Dusk. A tall figure in black picked her way carefully down the broken and narrow steps of the ancient quarry, carrying a slip of fine papyrus written in a familiar hand that she stroked between her long fingers before slipping into a concealed pocket.

_Meet me immediately_, it said, in a hurried scrawl without the usual neat penmanship. _Old quarry, third tomb from the left, lower level. Very sorry._

Unlike notes in the past, it was unsigned, without even an aleph to indicate the sender’s initial. 

The sky was filled with the sound of birds calling to each other to rest, the trees rustled with the evening wind, and the woman in black paused for a moment to listen before ducking into the dark void of an empty chamber in the stone.

“Let there be light,” a familiar voice spoke, and a gentle glow filled the dark chamber as a small clay lamp was lit.

“Oh hey, Aziraphale. Good to see you again so soon. Hope I didn’t keep you waiting.”

The angel was still wearing his old and patched mantle, the one he wore when he went about in disguise among the common folk, and Crowley thought it odd that the angel hadn’t changed yet. 

“Not at all, Crowley. I’m so very sorry to make you meet me like this,” Aziraphale said, his voice echoing in the empty tomb, no more than an abandoned hollow in an old quarry with a carved stone bench for a future corpse that was not ready yet to be buried. “After all, you’ll have to be ritually purified afterwards.”

“Nah,” Crowley waved it off, drawing back her black veil to reveal a headful of dark copper hair. “Mikveh isn’t really my kind of thing. Immersion would probably destroy me, if you think about it. We demons don’t do so well with purification.”

“Oh. Right.” Embarrassed, Aziraphale looked away. “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that-”

“Yes, I know. It’s fine, angel. Tell me what’s going on? That you wanted to meet so soon?” 

“I can’t stay long.”

“I know that, you never stay long, it’s not up to you-”

“No, I mean,” Aziraphale felt his shoulders slumping and he spoke quickly, as if to get all the words out as fast as possible. “I-I’m being recalled. We all are. Heaven is recalling everyone, effective as of midnight.”

“What?” Crowley was dumbstruck.

“I’m so sorry. It’s too sudden. I haven’t even divested my perfume business holdings yet. I meant to do that and give the money to the poor but the order came down just after sunset and...and I haven’t had time to do so many things and. And I just don’t want to go!”

“How long will you be gone?” Crowley asked, as casually as she could.

“I think this may be it, my dear.” Aziraphale shivered even though he never really got cold. “There’s intimations that the world’s ending soon.”

They sat under a ledge of rock outside the tomb, a jar of unmixed wine between them, drinking directly from the rough terracotta lip. The full moon shone bright, blotting out the stars and Crowley leaned back, kicking a rock so that it clattered echoing into the old pit of the quarry.

“Think I would have heard something from head office if they meant to end it all,” Crowley said, taking a long drink of wine before handing it back to Aziraphale.

“Falernian. It’s the best that can be bought. I thought once all this unpleasant business was settled, we could drink it together, to celebrate everything going back to normal.” Aziraphale said, his voice cracking. “We shouldn’t be drinking it neat like this. It’s unhealthy.”

“It’s awful. Too sweet and too strong. I like the Greek wines better.” Crowley reached over to put an arm around the jar and found herself with her arm around an angel instead.

“I do too.” Aziraphale sighed. “And it was so dear. I don’t know what I was thinking, buying this wine. No, I know what I was thinking, I was thinking that I wanted to throw a little party and play kottabos. With crowns of flowers and everything, just the two of us. I wanted to win for once. You’re too good at kottabos. If I didn’t know better I thought you’d be cheating.” 

“I don’t need to cheat when you can hardly hold your cup straight by the time you get to the dregs.” Crowley set the pointed bottom of the amphora into a miraculously deep spot of sand. “This jar’s too big to be drinking from. Why are we doing this again? Drinking next to a tomb...”

“We’re. We’re celebrating. My promotion to eternity,” Aziraphale said mournfully. “It’ll be just so wonderful.” He leaned into Crowley’s shoulder, and Crowley flinched when she realized that Aziraphale was crying.

“Hey, hey... No need for that, angel.” Crowley drew Aziraphale close. “It won’t be so bad, will it? Heaven’s wonderful, lots to do there. You’ll get to sing again, as much as you like. I wish I could hear that. You have a lovely singing voice.”

“Yes it will. I mean, it will be bad, not that it will be wonderful. I’ll be losing all my friends.”

“Oh come on, how many friends could that be? They’re all humans, you’d be losing them all anyway given enough time.”

“I don’t mean them. They’re not my friends, not truly. Not like you,” Aziraphale sniffed, face buried in the sleeves of his mantle, his voice muffled.

“Oh.” Crowley’s arm tightened around Aziraphale’s shoulders.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. If it’s an eternity in the depths of a choir singing words of praise...never to come back.” Aziraphale choked back a sob. “Who will feed my nightingale?”

“I will, promise.”

“And my darling, chattering starlings...”

“I’ll take good care of them, I promise.”

“Promise me you won’t teach them any swears.”

“You know I can’t promise that, angel. But I’ll do my best.”

“And...and all my rare texts; the scrolls and the tablets and...” 

“I’ll take them to Egypt and donate them to the Library of Alexandria, just like you always wanted.”

“And...what about me?”

Crowley said nothing, but drew Aziraphale close with both arms so that the angel’s head rested against her shoulder, her long dark hair falling to stroke against Aziraphale’s cheek. “You know you’ve been gone before. Why would it ever be any different?”

“Some powerful faction in the Assembly has been pulling the reins hard on Earth. I’m sure you’ve noticed, what with all the miracles. I didn’t think humans were even allowed to do miracles on this scale, not proper ones like us. Can you even bring a human back to life?”

“Don’t know, haven’t tried. But yes, head office hasn’t been pleased. Even Asmodeus had some choice things to say about it, and he normally never bothers with anything past approving my memos. I’ve been doing overtime, quite a lot of it, but it’s squarely coming down to Heaven having the advantage of initiative this time.” Crowley stroked her hand across Aziraphale’s back. “But even with all the extra work I haven’t heard anything about a recall on my end. Seems like it might be overblown. After all, they wouldn’t let me roam around on Earth without one of your lot roaming around too, right? Maybe it’s just a training…?” But then the word caught in Crowley’s throat, and she felt her breath catch with an old pain, remembering what happened to Aziraphale and how the angel had changed in the past after a prolonged recall to Heaven.

“I don’t want to cope with this by being drunk, but what else can I do?” Aziraphale sobbed quietly before taking a deep shuddering breath. “I’m sorry. I was having a moment there and it was uncalled for.”

“It’s fine to have a moment when you need one.” Crowley reached over and dried Aziraphale’s tears with the trailing edge of her fine silk veil, staining the black cloth gray. “That’s something you taught me.”

“Over three thousand years without having to go back for any longer than a quick meeting and now...” Aziraphale took a deep, steadying breath. “You’ll remember right? You’ll remember for me?”

“Always. And forever too,” Crowley said softly. “I promise.”

Aziraphale worried the golden ring on his right hand between his fingers, but then stopped. 

“My dear. Here are the keys to my house. In the garden underneath the big sycamore tree, there’s a loose brick. I’ve left something buried in the ground there for you, something that I’ve had a very long time. I want you to keep it to remember me by, in case I don’t come back.” 

“Thank you, Aziraphale.” _And what could I give to you to remember me by?_ Crowley thought to herself, but could not bear to say the words out loud. She knew what the answer was. There was no need to trouble the angel’s tender heart any further when there was nothing Crowley could give Aziraphale that could be taken to Heaven; the scrutiny surrounding an angel was such that any and every object of gross matter would come under inspection, assuming it survived the journey.

“I’m so sorry about all this.” Aziraphale untangled himself from the demon politely, drawing away with a sigh. “I should go before I’m called. It’s nearly midnight. They get rather angry if I don’t return early out of my own volition. Not that I’m really supposed to have any, you know. Free will.” Aziraphale managed the hint of a fragile smile. 

He took Crowley’s hands. Fingers entwined, the angel bowed his head and kissed those long delicate fingers one at a time before letting go, unfolding white wings that were all the whiter in the cold moonlight. “Be well. This parting must be endured. Know that I go unwillingly. I will pray for you, my dear, and I will always keep you closest to my heart.”

“Aziraphale...”

“Whatever happens, I will always remember you fondly. May we meet on a better occasion.”

“Aziraphale, wait-”

But before Crowley could draw him back, the angel was already gone, flying up toward Heaven, brilliant wings disappearing among the bright stars.


	6. Notes

Thanks to Elinekeit for listening to my drafts! And thanks to sigmastolen for listening to my rambling ideas. Thank you to all the readers for the support, and thanks for being patient with me; this notes chapter was a lot more involved than the previous ones.

Thanks also to Cris05 for helping confirm some details about Rome that I wasn’t quite sure on (and some other details that I didn’t know about but it’s okay, Atmostpheric Date Night was a success). And thanks to seashadows for answering some questions about Jewish customs. Finally, thanks to readers mecurtin and Elena for finding and pointing out some typos. Thanks to mecurtin for reccing some of my stories, which you can see here: https://doctorscienceknowsfandom.tumblr.com/post/186948396340/good-omens-fic-recs-with-plots

**Chapter 1**

I often have trouble picking a title, so one alternate title was: The Life of That One Caesar that Everyone Hates But Especially Crowley. But since Caligula is hardly in it, he doesn’t get a story named after him.

While doing preliminary research on the kind of building that this banquet would have been in (probably the Domus Tiberius), I found an article https://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/arts/12iht-otium.1.16069552.html that defined Otium: “_For the ancient Romans the word "otium" - the implications of which ranged from "a pause," through "ease" and "leisure" to "inactivity" and "sheer indolence" - was frought with ambiguity. Its opposite, "negotium" (non-otium), denoted activity, involvement in public affairs and administration, and generally the doing of business, from which our word "negotiate" derives._” 

Historian Eugen Weber describes Europe as “the little peninsulas of Asia” in The Western Tradition.

Crowley is definitely dressed too strangely to be identifiably Roman. I’m taking some liberties here with what she’s wearing on her shoulders. A chlamys is a Greek cloak, and specifically the one she is wearing is much more like a short soldier’s cloak rather than something a lady would be wearing. Someone wrote some interesting meta about it here: https://sensicalabsurdities.tumblr.com/post/186066810436/crowleys-roman-look-is-very-strange

Some info about the Domus Tiberius: https://www.jstor.org/stable/497538?seq=1/subjects and  
https://www.romeartlover.it/Palatin1.html However without full access to an archive like jstor, it was a bit too hard to find things like detailed floor plans and example mosaics, so I roughly based the palace on a Roman Villa, specifically the Villa dei Papiri.

A very nice reproduction of the Villa dei Papiri can be found at the Getty Villa in Malibu, CA. Lots of fruiting trees and excellent artwork. If you ever go, make sure to go see the Sculptural Group of a Seated Poet and Sirens.

Lucretia and Verginia’s stories are recounted in Livy’s The History of Rome, Books I and III respectively https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/10828/pg10828-images.html. These are Roman ladies who took death before dishonor very seriously, and were held up as ideals. More here: https://www.historyextra.com/period/roman/in-bed-with-the-romans-a-brief-history-of-sex-in-ancient-rome/

I remember deliberately choosing “chastity” and not “virtue”, because at this time virtue means “manliness”. 

Caligula is a nickname; I followed Suetonius who called him Gaius Caesar. Actually, it was Gaius Julius Caesar Germanicus. Speaking of Seutonius, I pulled a few quotes from two different translations: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/6400/6400-h/6400-h.htm#link2H_4_0005 and http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html

Suetonius, in the Life of Caligula, section 36 describes Caligula’s dealings with married women. I considered quoting it here but then I’d have to add even more tags, so you can read it on your own if you’re inclined. And various other sections describe how Caligula treated their husbands, notably by condemning them and taking their property. 

It will take about 15 days to travel to Alexandria by express. How do I know? http://orbis.stanford.edu/ 

**Chapter 2**

****

Suetonius, in the Life of Caligula, sections 50 and 52 describes how Caligula looked and dressed, including how he took Alexander’s breastplate from Alexander’s tomb and would wear it.

Albina means ‘bright’ or ‘white’. 

Apollo has chased a lot of nymphs. Too bad he is only colossally disappointing in bed (according to Cassandra). https://16ruedelaverrerie.tumblr.com/post/113902636033/hit-him-where-it-hurts-cassandra-apollo-is-the 

Maius is the Roman name for the month of May. 

Black clothes in ancient Rome were worn as a sign of mourning.

“So beautiful a throat must be cut whenever I please” comes from Suetonius.

Women generally wore a sleeved tunica, a stola over that, and a palla over that, unless they were prostitutes in which case they would wear togas. Except Crowley is wearing a short Greek chlamys over the stola because he is extra and loves his ancient Greek fashions way more than these new Roman stylings. More here on Roman women’s clothing: http://members.ozemail.com.au/~chrisandpeter/radical_romans/female/female.htm

“There is nothing in my nature that I commend or approve so much, as my inflexible rigor” comes from Suetonius.

There are lots of examples of explicit Roman frescoes in Pompeii, among other places.

A wild anachronism has appeared! When Rome won the Punic Wars, the wars against Carthage, Carthage was razed but the ground was not salted; this legend is apparently a 19th century invention. So let’s call this some gross exaggeration on Caligula’s part. And I mean, gross. Yuck. 

After writing the Epic of Gilgamesh story, I felt that there was something very appealing about the idea of Crowley occasionally stepping in for some woman in a bad situation and just absolutely fucking over whoever thought it would be a good idea to molest powerless women. 

In this series of stories, Crowley didn’t pick up the time-stopping powers until after eating the plant of immortality: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19822747/chapters/47261098 

Crowley doesn’t really want to purify anything; Crowley just wants to burn it all down. 

Crowley has just invented that looking-over-the-top-of-your-glasses glare.

Suetonius, in the Life of Caligula, section 58 describes Caligula’s death at the hands of his centurions and praetorian tribunes. Someone shouted “Take this” and Caligula was stabbed multiple times, including several times in the groin. Did Crowley cause this to happen? I don’t know, but he sure didn’t try to stop it.

Suetonius, in the Life of Caligula, section 50 talks about Caligula being prone to bad nightmares. Probably Crowley made it worse.

Funny coincidence: apparently the original prop for the laurel wreath that Crowley is seen wearing was also gold, before they changed it into silver. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10157436232084188&type=3&__tn__=-UC-R This was not intentional; I wrote this way before I saw the photoset.

A talent is a unit of measure by weight. A Roman talent was equivalent to 100 Roman pounds (libra) which is about 72.5 pounds (32.95 kg). So Crowley estimates that this laurel wreath is about 3.625 pounds (1.647 kg) of electrum. Is he right? I don’t know. More on money here: http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~lac61/ASSIGNMENTS/SectionOne/RomanMoney.html

**Chapter 3**

I interpreted “house brown” to be beer and not wine. There is a cut scene from the script book that suggests that they got wine; I was inspired by the Caligula portion of the script book but followed the show regarding the drinks.

I noticed that there is a very noticable gap between Crowley’s sleeve and the draped cloth over his right arm, which in part inspired this story. 

Actually a human could seriously harm either one of them, given the opportunity. Time-stopping powers just gives Crowley an edge.

I have been writing Egyptian lavender as Aziraphale’s preferred scent for clothing. Now that Aziraphale’s fixed his clothing, Crowley looks a little more respectable, wearing a nice lady-like palla as opposed to his weird short chlamys business.

One would never wear a laurel crown, much less one made from precious metals, unless it was to celebrate a major victory. Or you know, one could just steal one off the emperor and call it a day...be gay, do crimes.

I remember reading somewhere a long time ago that the ancient Greeks would add some fresh leaves to a laurel crown made of precious metals for modesty, but I honestly don’t remember where. 

Bay and laurel are the same plant. And now if Crowley wanted to, he could also season some soup with his floral crown. Though if he added the lotus, it would be a psychedelic soup.

I’ve been using the blue lotus and the white lotus as Crowley and Aziraphale’s preferred ancient world party wear flower, respectively. Lots of nice ancient Egyptian imagery/significance to lotuses.

Training takes a lot longer for Aziraphale than it should because he resists it strongly. I think he’ll get smarter about this and pretend more.

I have some ideas why Crowley doesn’t have very much supervision compared to Aziraphale.

Falernian is the most expensive and sought-after wine in the Roman Empire, so to refuse it is kind of strange when you know it’s not that they can’t afford the wine.

Aziraphale asked for Greek-style drinking implements; Romans apparently mixed wine to their taste. Wine would have come in an amphora, which is a long slender jar with a pointed end. 

Attic refers to Attica, aka the region of Greece that includes Athens.

Ancient Greeks and Romans cropped their hair short when in mourning. I think this is the first time Crowley cut his hair this short.

Garum is a very pungent ancient Roman fish sauce. Makes me wonder: if Crowley doesn’t like garum, would he eat Thai food? Maybe he’ll like it better after 2000ish years of acquiring a taste.

There is a lot written about oysters in the ancient world. First I started with Apicius, Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome https://www.gutenberg.org/files/29728/29728-h/29728-h.htm  
Then the ‘little round oysters’ Aziraphale talks about are native British oysters : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/food-and-drink/features/why-we-need-to-celebrate-british-native-oysters/  
Then even more on oysters (nowhere near definitive):  
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3293643?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents oysters  
https://tinyurl.com/y6x6k63g  
And finally some queer film history, thanks to reader Anathema Device (notowned), this wonderful bit of Spartacus that was sadly cut from the movie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yzY-HUvavU 

Normally Roman meals were three courses, but elite banquet meals could be more. I’m imagining this particular meal as a sort of tasting menu of many small courses. Did such a thing exist? I don’t know, but surely angelic influences might make it happen.

Usually the third course of a meal was dessert. Honey cake seems to be a pretty common dessert in ancient Rome (see Apicius).

Since oysters were so expensive in Rome, I decided that this restaurant wouldn’t serve them raw, because they were too hard to source. So probably most of the oysters came brined.

Did Aziraphale travel to Britannia with Julius Caesar’s army? 

I have an idea for Aziraphale and Crowley helping raise a young Alexander the Great.

**Chapter 4**

This website helps me figure out the phases of the moon when I write these things set in the ancient world: https://www.moonpage.com/index.html?go=T&auto_dst=T&tzone=ut&m=1&d=5&y=0041&hour=12&min=18&sec=43 So this story is set sometime between January 1 and January 5, 41 C.E., as the moon is not quite full.

The Pons Aemilius, aka Ponto Rotto, is the oldest bridge in Rome. A part of it still survives to this day. http://ancientworld.hansotten.com/italy/rome/pons-aemilius/ 

I used these two map projects to roughly get an idea where Crowley and Aziraphale walked. http://mappingrome.com/NFUR/  
http://nolli.uoregon.edu/ 

The idea is that they met in a tavern somewhere near the Coliseum, then walked across the Pons Aemilius to a restaurant on the other side of the river in what would later be the Trastevere District (Rione), and then walked back to the neighborhood where Crowley is staying.

Crowley (and probably Aziraphale too) is staying in the Sant'Angelo District (rione) of Rome. It won’t be called that for some time, but it’s Palantine Hill-adjacent and convenient for people who are being sent to tempt Emperors and future Emperors.

The stone knife is first described in the Epic of Gilgamesh story. I imagine that if it has survived to the modern day, it lives in Crowley’s bedroom, probably locked in a safe or a display case.

Romans traded in silk which at that time would have come from China and was very valuable. However, in theory Aziraphale could have had that silk from his own travels.

There is a lot about the sycamore. I picked the tree because of a standard Middle Kingdom grammatical phrase about a woman in a sycamore tree. It turns out though that: “_The sycamore tree was related to romance, due to its manifestation in it of the goddess Hathor, the goddess of love. More specifically, it was a trysting tree; it was a place where lovers met. It doesn't only provide cool, deep shade and seclusion, but actively participated in lovers' affairs._” From: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/313473899_The_Sycamore_in_Ancient_Egypt_-_Textual_Iconographic_Archaeopalynological_Thoughts_Mohammed_AZZAZY_Azza_EZZAT

I think I have figured out the times when Aziraphale was sent back for training. Post-Flood, Post-Crucifixion, sometime during the Dark Ages, and most recently, just after WWII. But I think he gets a lot better at not taking everything at face value and protecting himself from mental manipulation.

Since Crowley isn’t staying in Rome long, he’s rented a room in an insula, which is basically like an apartment building. More on insulas here: https://www.historyextra.com/period/roman/five-facts-roman-insulae/ Google image search for “insula ancient rome” for lots of models and examples. 

Crowley is inviting Aziraphale up for a little Greek-style drinking party, a symposium, where kottabos, a drinking game would be played. More on both here: https://blogs.getty.edu/iris/reclining-and-dining-and-drinking-in-ancient-greece/

Why Alexandria? Even though Alexandria is in Egypt, it is a Hellenistic city, so they would have had a lot of Greek cultural influences as well. Also I like that they have a fondness for Egypt, a place that worked on staying the same for as long as it could.

Sappho’s works are in an Aeolian (Aeolic) dialect that was hard to understand and going out of fashion by this time (sorry, can’t remember where I read this), but I imagined this person as a slave far from home singing an old song to herself. This song rightly should be accompanied by a lyre or a kithara, but this person does not have access to an instrument. Sappho herself supposedly played a tenor instrument, a barbitos, which is like a tenor lyre. Some music historians thought that she sang contralto.

Lots more about lyres, kitharas, and barbitos in Music in Ancient Greece & Rome by John Landels.

This translation comes from Sappho: A New Translation, by Mary Barnard. Part 3, number 42. I took a few tiny liberties resetting the format of the text, but overall it is the same.

**Chapter 5**

I thought I had finished this work at chapter 4, but then I got to thinking and added another chapter. I had at one point thought about opening the story with this chapter, but it eventually it made more sense to put this chapter at the end.

The tomb of Jesus was also located in an old limestone quarry, which at the time was on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Is it the same quarry? I think it could be. More here: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/10/jesus-christ-tomb-burial-church-holy-sepulchre/

Is it the same tomb? No, this is a different tomb. By now Jesus would have been buried.

Why a graveyard at dusk? This was to parallel the bandstand scene at the end of Episode 3 where Aziraphale and Crowley meet somewhere in that is neither inside nor outside, at a time that is neither day nor night, with a round decorative plate in the center of the bandstand that seems to stand in for the Earth. Thus at this quarry graveyard they are also in a similar liminal space, neither inside nor outside, not in the world of the living nor the dead, caught between Heaven and Hell in a place that is not quite the surface world and not quite the subterranean yet open to the sky, and at a time that is neither day nor night, though it quickly turns into night. Furthermore, the time between the Death and Resurrection of Christ is also another liminal time.

Papyrus was used at this time for all sorts of things including mummy wrappings (cartonnage) and books (scrolls).

Trivia time: The Hebrew letter for aleph is used in math to notate different sizes of infinity (infinite sets).

Aziraphale lights the lamp in an ordinary, non-supernatural way, but can’t help but be extra.

I decided that the conversation that Aziraphale and Crowley have at the crucifixion was rehearsed; they knew that Heaven and Hell would be watching so they planned out a very deliberately fake conversation to hide their friendship. 

Contact with the dead is one reason a person would need ritual purification. There is a lot written about mikveh, I won’t presume to know what’s a good source, but this seemed reasonable for a general overview (there is way more to it than this article mentions): https://hekint.org/2018/05/24/jewish-ritual-immersion-in-the-mikveh-and-the-concept-of-communal-immunity/ Thanks to reader seashadows for answering some questions about ritual purification.

Wine was stored in amphoras, with their ends set in sand. https://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/amphorae.html

Greeks drank wine usually mixed three to one with water. There are lots of sources on this but if you want some future reading: https://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/wine.html 

Cherubim are supposed to be constantly singing praise to God, and I’ve been writing Aziraphale as a demoted cherubim.

Romans kept nightingales and starlings as pets: http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/CJ/44/4/Household_Pets*.html

The Library of Alexandria was burned down by this time, but there were efforts to rebuild; Aziraphale just wants to donate his books.

I mentioned an Assembly of Heaven in the Babylonian Flood story to parallel the Assembly of Gods in the original text. Basically, the Assembly had a lot to do with deciding that the Earth should be (locally) destroyed.

Pliny, Book VI, Chapter 20 complains about how silk is so transparent that “our ladies may in public display their charms”. I noticed that the veil that Crowley wears to the crucifixion is very sheer, so I’m interpreting that as silk, though Cris05 helpfully pointed out that it is probably some modern organza or chiffon that’s meant to stand in for silk (too sheer, not the right sheen).

Aziraphale quotes Sappho in his parting words. I love the idea that they quote Sappho to each other in private. More on this in another story.

In some ways this story is the end of a 3000 year cycle. I’ll be backfilling other stories that go up to this point. Was it wise to post it out of order? Probably not, but we’ll see how it goes. Wish me luck. :)


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